A ‘trapdoor’ made of muscle and fat helps fin whales eat without choking
Some of the world’s largest whales feed by lunging through the water with mouths wide open. Scientists have long wondered how the animals withstand...
SCIENTIFIC NEWS
Gold and silver tubes in a Russian museum are the oldest known drinking straws
Eight silver and gold tubes held in a Russian museum have long been thought to have been either ceremonial staffs or canopy supports. In...
These tiny beetles fly fast thanks to wing bristles and a weird, wide stroke
Featherwing beetles are some of the world’s smallest flying insects. Yet they can rocket along with the speed and agility of much larger insects....
A disinfectant made from sawdust mows down deadly microbes
A new, sustainable disinfectant made from sawdust and water can knock out more than 99 percent of some disease-causing microbes, including anthrax and several...
Volcanic avalanches of rock and gas may be more destructive than previously thought
Avalanches of ash, gas and rock that cascade downhill during volcanic eruptions may be even more dangerous than scientists had realized. Pulses of high...
Take an online journey through the history of math
Around 1900 B.C., a student in the Sumerian city of Nippur, in what’s now Iraq, copied a multiplication table onto a clay tablet. Some...
Scientists vacuumed animal DNA out of thin air for the first time
On a dreary winter day in December of 2020, ecologist Elizabeth Clare strolled through the Hamerton Zoo Park in England wielding a small vacuum...
A genetic analysis hints at why COVID-19 can mess with smell
For many people, one of the fastest tip-offs that they have COVID-19 is the loss of taste or smell. Now researchers have pinpointed some...
Part donkey, part wild ass, the kunga is the oldest known hybrid bred by humans
From mules to ligers, the list of human-made hybrid animals is long. And, it turns out, ancient. Meet the kunga, the earliest known hybrid...
50 years ago, NASA’s space shuttle program got the green light
The decision on the shuttle is ‘go’ — Science News, January 15, 1972 President Nixon’s announcement last week of the decision to begin development of a space...
A new treatment could restore some mobility in people paralyzed by strokes 
What has Perseverance found in two years on Mars? 
This robot automatically tucks its limbs to squeeze through spaces 
Greta Thunberg’s new book urges the world to take climate action now